


Growing on Me

by StBridget



Category: MacGyver (TV 2016)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Declarations Of Love, M/M, Soulmates, Whump
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-22
Updated: 2016-12-22
Packaged: 2018-09-11 06:23:16
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,206
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8962402
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/StBridget/pseuds/StBridget
Summary: Some people are lucky enough to be born with a soul-mate.  Jack isn't one of those.Some people are lucky enough to find a soul-mate anyway.  Jack is one of those.





	

**Author's Note:**

> MacGyver is property of CBS and its creators.

Some people are born with soul-mates.  When they enter this world, their soul reaches across time and space and connects with another in a blaze of light to rival the Big Bang.  When this happens, you know immediately that someone, somewhere, is destined for only you, and their soul becomes a siren song drawing you to them.  But it only happens to a lucky few.

Jack Dalton was not one of those lucky few.  He always felt he should be.  He went through life with an ache in his heart that _should_ be filled with a soul-mate, but he knew as surely as he knew his own name that there was no one out there for him.

So, he sought other ways to fill the void.  Delta Force went a long way towards making him feel complete.  There was something about having your team’s life in your hands that created a bond like no other.  That satisfied the longing in Jack.  For a while.

Then Jack met Sarah.  She was everything Jack could hope for in a woman:  smart, funny, tough, and able to take him in a fight.  Jack fell hard and fast.  Not soul-mate level, but definitely someone he could see spending the rest of his life with.  Only thing was, she had a boyfriend, and Jack had to be content with having her back.  And he was.  And, gradually, time and distance pushed what he could have had to the back of his mind.

Until she resurfaced in Central America.  In a flash, the intervening years vanished, and all Jack’s bottled up feelings came rushing back.  They worked just as well together as ever, and Jack had hope that maybe he’d finally found what he was looking for.  Then, her fiancé showed up, and Jack’s hopes were once again dashed.

Mac, sensing Jack’s devastation, took him out for beers.  Jack was grateful.  The kid was Jack’s rock, the only constant over the last few years, not just a partner, but a friend or even a brother.  Or maybe something more.

The whole team was important to Jack—Patty, Riley, Nikki before her betrayal, even Bozer.  Riley had always felt like a daughter to him, and he’d remained protective of her even after he and her mother broke up, and Riley started to hate him.  Her addition to the team had brought those feelings back ten-fold.  Bozer was important to Mac, and therefore important to Jack.

None of them were as important as Mac.  Sure, they’d gotten off to a rocky start—Mac was a cocky kid, in Jack’s view, and Jack was all brawn and no brains in Mac’s.  That had soon changed, though, and after just a short while they were working together like a well-oiled machine.

That drifted into their personal lives.  As their partnership grew, so did their friendship, until they shared everything—hopes, dreams, and heartaches a like.  Jack was there for Mac’s physical and emotional recovering after Nikki’s “death”, and Mac was the first one by Jack’s side when Sarah left.  Again.

They sat at the bar in their favorite hangout, nursing beers, Jack searching for answers in his, and Mac just being there for his friend, waiting for Jack to share what was on his mind.

“Do you ever feel like you’re destined to be alone?” Jack asked.  He was feeling maudlin and wallowing in self-pity, a side effect of having his heart broken by the same woman—twice—no doubt.

“Sometimes,” Mac said.  “I felt like that after my dad left, but Bozer was there to pick up the pieces.  Then again at MIT, and in the army, until I met you.”  Mac hesitated, wondering just how much to reveal.  “Now, I know you’ll always have my back.”

Jack let out a small grin and slapped Mac on the back.  “Same with you, buddy.”  He grew serious again.  “No, I mean romantically.”

“I know.”  Mac fiddled with an abandoned straw on the bar, twisting into an intricate shape, much like he did the paperclips ubiquitous in the Phoenix Foundation offices.  He spoke carefully when he finally spoke again.  “Same thing, really.  I always felt out of place, incomplete, like something was missing.  Then. . .” He paused again.

“You met Nikki,” Jack finished.  He didn’t want to intrude on Mac’s privacy, or reopen old wounds (there’d been enough of that with the whole Sarah situation), but he had to push.  “Was she your soul-mate?”

“No.  Don’t get me wrong, she was great, and I loved her, and I was shattered by her betrayal—still am—but she wasn’t my soul-mate.”  Mac stopped, unable—or unwilling—to go on.

Jack sensed Mac had more to say on the matter of soul-mates.  He took a gamble at Mac’s meaning.  “So, your soul-mate’s still out there.”

“I wasn’t lucky enough to be born with one,” Mac said—too quickly in Jack’s mind.  There was something Mac wasn’t saying.

“But. . .” Jack prompted.

Mac found another straw and began playing with it, not responding to Jack.  He was silent so long, Jack was just about to let it go when Mac spoke.

“I don’t think all soul-mates are born,” Mac said, thoughtfully.  “I think sometimes there’s someone who comes into your life by happenstance that gradually fills a hole you maybe didn’t even know you had, and soon this person carves out a part of your soul and slips right in like they belong there.”

“They grow on you,” Jack quipped.

Mac thought about this.  “Yeah, I guess so.”

Jack studied Mac, wondering what was going through his mind, but the younger man remained focused on his straw creation.  “You have one of those,” Jack surmised.

“I think so,” Mac said, quietly.

“But she doesn’t know.”

Mac laughed, slightly bitterly.  “No, _he_ doesn’t.”  The emphasis was slight, but there.

“Well, he doesn’t know what he’s missing.”

“No,” Mac said, practically inaudible, “he doesn’t.”

Mac’s words provided food for thought.  Maybe that’s the way it was with Jack, although he certainly knew something was missing.  Maybe there was someone out there just waiting to “grow on him”.  That would certainly explain the ache Jack always felt.  Maybe there was hope after all.  He just had to meet someone who would come to mean the world to him.

Jack realized he had when the Murdoc Incident occurred.  When he told Mac it would kill him if anything happened to the younger man, Jack realized truer words had never been spoken.  Somewhere along the way, between the bickering and the banter and the teasing, Mac had become the most important person in Jack’s life.  Jack knew, even though they hadn’t been born that way, “soul-mates” was the only way to describe them.  Jack also knew it was hopelessly one-sided.  Mac may be _Jack’s_ soul-mate, but he wasn’t _Mac’s_.  Mac had already met his, even if whoever the guy was didn’t realize it.

Jack just had to be content with making Mac the center of his universe, even if it wasn’t reciprocated.  Watching Mac’s back became more important than ever, and Jack threw himself into with ten times the urgency and with even less regard for his personal safety.

That drive led Jack to hurl himself between Mac and an assault rifle, unerringly getting off a kill shot before collapsing.  Mac raced to Jack’s side and knelt down, ripping apart the older man’s shirt to better see his wounds.  “What the fuck did you do that for?” the blond demanded.

“Watching your back,” Jack got out with effort.  Damn, breathing hurt.  He knew on some level he probably had a punctured lung, but that took second place to just forcing air into his lungs.  “That’s what I do.”

“Not at the cost of your own life!” Mac said, angrily.

“Yeah,” Jack said, gasping for air.  He coughed and was alarmed to see it tinged with blood.  Definitely a punctured lung.  Looks like he wasn’t walking away from this one.  Oh, well.  It was worth it if Mac was okay.  “I’m expendable,” Jack explained.

“No, you’re not!” Mac retorted, furious.

“Yeah, I am.”  Jack’s chest hurt like a motherfucker, and black spots were starting to swim before his eyes.  He knew he couldn’t hang on my longer.  “Besides, told you it would kill me if anything happened to you.”

“Well, looks like you got your wish,” Mac spat out.  “Did you ever think what would happen to me if anything happened to you?  Did you ever think it might kill _me?”_

“Nah,” Jack managed, struggling to stay conscious long enough to say this to Mac.  “You’ve got your soul-mate.  If I lose you, I lose mine.”  He hoped Mac understood what he was saying.  He didn’t have the energy to explain any further.

“No, I don’t!” Mac practically screamed.  “Don’t you get it, you idiot?  _You’re_ my soul-mate!”

Jack was stunned.  That had never occurred to him.  “Oh,” was all he could manage.  His eyes drifted shut.

Mac slapped him, hard, and Jack’s eyes fluttered open again.  “Oh, no, you don’t.  You are not going to fucking die on me, do you hear?” Mac ordered.

Jack tried, he really did, but the forces drawing him under were too much.  “Don’t think you can improvise your way out of this one,” he said as he lost his grip on consciousness.

The last thing he heard Mac say was “Like hell I can’t.”

The next thing Jack was aware of was a bright, white light shining in his eyes.  He tried to shield his eyes from the glare, but his arms wouldn’t respond.  Gradually, his eyes adjusted, but all Jack saw was more white—white floor, white walls, white ceiling, white everything.  _Heaven sure looks a lot like a hospital room,_ was his first thought.  Then, Jack realized he _was_ in a hospital room.  He wasn’t dead after all.

As Jack regained full consciousness, he took stock of himself and his surroundings.  Everything hurt, especially his chest.  He felt like he’d gone several rounds with an assault rifle and lost.  Oh, wait, he had.  Jack tried to take a deep breath but started coughing, which hurt even worse, _dammit_.  He became aware of a tube running under his nose.  Oxygen.  Frankly, Jack was surprised he didn’t have a breathing tube.  Then again, his dry, achy throat indicated that he _had_ had one, but it had been removed at some point in the not-too-distant past.

Jack’s mind moved from his physical body to the wires running out of it and into a loudly beeping machine.  Monitors.  Of course.  Jack wondered how long it would take before someone realized he was awake.  Jack sent his senses out further and became aware of a weight on the bed not caused by his own body.  He painfully looked down and saw Mac slumped over the bed, dead asleep.  His hair was oily and matted, streaks of blood that looked like they had only been half-heartedly scrubbed away decorated his hands and arms, and dried blood soaked his shirt.  It looked like the kid hadn’t moved since Jack had been brought in.  And how long had that been, anyway?

“Mac?” Jack croaked.

The blond awoke instantly, jerking upright and turning bloodshot eyes rimmed with dark circles on his partner.  “Jack?  You’re awake!  You’re _alive_!”

“Yeah, not quite sure how that happened.”  Jack meant it as a joke, but it came out as a legitimate question.

Mac managed a smile, but it didn’t reach his eyes.  “You were wrong.  I _was_ able to improvise my way out of it.”

Jack returned the smile, even though even that hurt.  “You missed your calling.  You should have been a field medic instead of EOD.”

“Yeah.”  Mac gripped Jack’s hand in both of his and absently traced shapes on the back of it.  “God, man, I can’t tell you how glad I am you’re alive.”

“Me, too.  Guess it was a close thing, huh?”  Jack knew it had been.  He knew he’d been dying, and nothing short of a miracle could have saved him.  But, then, pulling miracles out of thin air was kind of Mac’s thing.

“Too close.”  Mac’s eyes grew haunted, and he shuddered at the thought of what he’d almost—was sure he _had_ —lost.

Jack sensed Mac’s pain and moved the conversation along.  “How long have I been here?”

“Three days,” Mac replied.  “And that was _after_ 17 hours in surgery to repair the damage caused by _jumping in front of a fucking assault rifle!_ ”  The last words came out angry, but tinged with relief.  It had been a close thing.  Too close.  Jack had coded on the operating table more times than Mac cared to think about.

“I won’t do it again,” Jack promised.

“Yeah, you would.  You will,” Mac said.  “So would I.  I guess that’s what soul-mates do for each other.”

“Soul-mates, huh?” Jack said softly, hopefully.

“Yeah, soul-mates.” Mac smiled tenderly at Jack, and this time it reached his eyes.  “You grew on me.”

Jack reached over with his other hand and placed it on top of where Mac’s still rested on top of his.  He squeezed, hard, hoping to convey the depth of his emotion.  “You grew on me, too.”

**Author's Note:**

> This really does reflect my view on soul-mates. I also think you can lose a soul-mate--eventually, they don't fill a need any more. I've experienced all of the above.


End file.
